A need exists for interfacing object oriented software applications with relational databases. One method of interfacing an object oriented application with a relational database is to adapt the queries made by the application to the relational database. More particularly, object operations are translated into relational database calls. However, this technique is processor-intensive and sacrifices some of the advantages associated with the object oriented model. As a result, the object oriented software application is unable to function efficiently.
Another method of interfacing an object oriented application with a relational database is to translate database information into a format which is compatible with the object oriented application. Relational databases typically separate data into a plurality of tables through a process known as "normalization" to minimize duplication. A normalized relational database includes a plurality of tables, wherein each table includes at least one field and one key, and each field in each table is uniquely dependent upon the table's key. These tables can be directly translated into objects. However, normalized tables are structured quite differently from objects. More particularly, the collection of information in the fields of the tables often fails to match the collection of information that would typically be found in a well designed object. Consequently, such objects can cause problems for the software application.